Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Now this has nothing to do with motor racing, not directly anyway,but an item on AOL news struck my fancy. Fitness pioneer Jack LaLanne passed away at the ripe old age of 96. Great you think. Well from what I've seen here in the US Jack failed miserably. And on a personal note, my Father never worked out a day in his life apart from the odd game of tennis, smoked until he was 55, drank and put more salt on his food than anyone I have seen, and died at 97. So, all you fitness fanatics, relax. It's all in the genes it seems.

So, talking of active old men, the Bernie bribery scandal will not go away, not that I expected it to. I think someone is out to nail Bernie in this. Stern, the German news magazine that just loves this stuff, says it has a letter that shows Bernie paid the bribe. I don't think it does. It is supposedly a letter from a lawyer on behalf of Gribkowsky asking for the balance of the money, $2.3m. That is a bit different to a check stub from Bernie's bank, and who are the sources that said Bernie was outraged at receiving the letter? All the people close enough to Bernie to know that have been with him forever because they are loyal and keep their mouth shut. And maybe Bernie was outraged because he never paid the bribe in the first place? Stern are going to keep digging and it seems in this day and age almost anything is discoverable. The question remains, if they can prove he did it, what then? Do the German authorities act? Is the original deal reversible? Would Bernie go to jail? This has the potential of shaking the current F1 foundations. Or is it another "Hitler's Diary?" Wasn't Stern involved in that little fraud?

Just after the Korean GP boss is let go the Indian GP boss, Mark Hughes, has left "for personal reasons." Always a nice euphemism that. Meanwhile the Australian GP boss, Ron Walker has hit back at the Mayor of Melbourne saying that the GP is a "huge profit" for the city and the State. Unfortunately for Ron the State Premier is suggesting he would not mind if they did not have to pay quite so much for all this "profit."

The "will the real Lotus please stand up" court case started today, so much for settling it out of court. It is only a preliminary hearing so this farce seems likely to drag on all year.

All of Audi's drivers from last years 1-2-3 finish at Le Mans have re-signed for 2011, and why wouldn't they after that performance?

Only three days to the start of practice for the Rolex, and a week till F1 testing kicks off. It's nearly over.